My responses to Geraldine Hilton’s
replies to my rebuttals of claims in her “Einstein’s Wife” documentary.
Allen Esterson
In response to my enumeration of errors and misleading
statements in the documentary “Einstein’s Wife”, the writer/producer Geraldine
Hilton submitted to the PBS Ombudsman a response
that he has copied in an article on his website (scroll down to the end).
I provide below my comments on Hilton’s
responses, but first a general point. At the beginning of the enumerated list
of errors I clearly stated that the documentation for my statements can be found
in the full critique posted on my
website. Hilton’s responses (below in CAPITALS) indicate she has made no
attempt to examine this documentation or address rebuttals of her claims; she
merely repeats her assertions.
In each instance I start by quoting
Hilton’s responses, which are prefaced
by my enumerated statements in bold type.
On claims made in the “Einstein’s Wife” documentary:
1. Marić
was not a "brilliant mathematician." IN UNDERTAKING STUDIES IN THEORETICAL PHYSICS
MARIĆ, AS INDEED ANY STUDENT, HAD TO BE HIGHLY PROFICIENT IN MATHEMATICS
AS ANY PHYSICIST WILL ATTEST. DESANKA Trbuhović-Gjurić, IN HER
BIOGRAPHY OF MILEVA MARIĆ LOCATED MARIĆ'S HIGH SCHOOL RESULTS. DORD
KRSTIĆ, ANOTHER BIOGRAPHER OF MARIĆ, CITES HER TRANSCRIPTS. SEE
FOLLOWING:
[There follows a detailed report of
Marić’s secondary school record, and information about the course she
attended as a student at Zurich Polytechnic. A Google search shows that Hilton
has simply copied her list straight from the Mileva Marić
entry in
Wikipedia – of which more below.]
Marić attended a four year course
at Zurich Polytechnic (later ETH) for a diploma to teach mathematics and
physics to secondary school teachers. To suppose that the theoretical elements
in this course required a student to be a “brilliant mathematician” by the
standards required for advanced mathematics illustrates Hilton’s profound
ignorance of the subject. The Wikipedia entry that she has copied cites
(correctly) Marić’s excellent school results in mathematics prior to
attending Zurich Polytechnic. This demonstrates nothing more than that
Marić was talented at that level of mathematics. Hilton has no conception
of the fact that this is elementary
mathematics from the point of view of academic mathematicians or theoretical
physicists. Irrelevantly, Hilton copies from Wikipedia a list of the subjects
studied by Marić in her second year
as a student as if these are impressive. These are merely the standard topics
that comprise any University course for mathematics and physics students.
Omitted from Hilton’s response are the
significant facts that not only does the Marić/Einstein correspondence
indicate that Marić struggled to master descriptive and projective
geometry (letter, August/September 1899), her grade in the mathematics
component (theory of functions) of the final diploma exam in 1900 was 5 on a
scale 1-12, whereas Einstein achieved grade 11 and no other student in their
group of five (the others specialising in mathematics) obtained lower than
grade 11. It is almost certain that her poor grade in mathematics was the
reason for her failing the 1900 exam (and again in 1901).
[N.B. As the reference to Michelmore’s
biography in the Wikipedia entry for Mileva Marić
is erroneous, I have deleted the item from that webpage, giving the explanation
in the Wikipedia discussion page.]
2. There
is no evidence that Marić "collaborated with Einstein on his 1905
papers on Brownian Motion, Special Relativity and the photoelectric effect.”
REFER BELOW.
I’ll take up the referral to items 22,
23, 24:
It is tiresome to have to keep repeating
that Hilton has made no attempt to examine the detailed examination (and
refutation) of such claims (in books by John Stachel, and articles by me), but
again and again this is the case. All
of the contentions made by Hilton immediately below have been refuted in detail, and here I can only briefly
touch on these refutations.
(22). Marić did not work with Einstein on the E=mc2 1905 paper. WHY
THEN DID EINSTEIN WRITE TO MARIĆ "'How happy and proud I will be,
when we two together have victoriously led our work on relative motion to an
end!' — Albert Einstein." EINSTEIN'S WORDS ARE EVIDENCE ALONE THAT THEY
HAD ALREADY COMMENCED JOINT RESEARCH ON RELATIVE MOTION THEORY.
As John Stachel has argued, as have I,
Einstein wrote that sentence in specific circumstances in a context in which,
as always during their student period, he was hoping to draw Marić into
his extra-curricular interests. Briefly (i) there are a dozen other instances
when Einstein refers specifically to his work, his ideas on motion relative to the ether. (ii) the relevant
Einstein letters were written in the period 1899-1901, when Einstein was still
working on the basis of classical Galilean
relativity (iii) the letter from which Hilton quotes was written in 1901,
whereas Einstein did not arrive at his epoch-making special relativity
principle until 1905.
(23). Abraham Joffe did not "cite both Albert's and Mileva's names on
the original manuscripts" of 1905. ESTERSON ADMITS THAT "It is
unusual that Joffe this one time happened to refer to Einstein by the name
'Einstein-Marity'!!! REFER BELOW #23.
First, I have not written anywhere that
“It is unusual that Joffe this one time happened to refer to Einstein by the
name ‘Einstein-Marity’.” Hilton is confusing me with Alberto Martinez. And
despite her triumphant triple exclamation marks, she fails to mention that
(24). The fragment of a page shown on the screen is not from the work the
narrator claims. A. F. Joffe (also: Ioffe), "In Remembrance of Albert
Einstein", Uspekhi Fizicheskikh Nauk, Volume 57, Number 2,
(1955), p. 187. THE 'FRAGMENT' IN THE DOCUMENTARY IS FROM AN ARTICLE WRITTEN BY
DANIL DANNIN, RUSSIAN AUTHOR WHO QUOTED DIRECTLY FROM ABRAM JOFFE'S
Hilton acknowledges that the fragment of
microfilm shown in her film was by Danin. She fails to address the fact that
her film deceived viewers into thinking that they were shown a fragment from Joffe’s book. Why does she not admit
that in the film Danin’s name is not mentioned, and that viewers are (mis)led
to believe that what they are seeing is by Joffe? Hilton writes that Danin
quoted directly from Joffe’s obituary, and “the quote is Joffe’s”. It is bad
enough that Hilton has failed to examine the documentation in the article
linked to my enumerated list of errors; in addition she is evidently incapable
of understanding articles she has seen
(Martinez [2005] above).
NOTE: Although Hilton cites the original publication by Joffe, in actuality she has directly copied the relevant part of her long statement above, starting from ABRAHAM F JOFFE …” through to “…AS ASCRIBING THE 1905 PAPERS TO 'EINSTEIN-MARITY', directly from Andrea Gabor’s book Einstein’s Wife: Work and Marriage in the Lives of Five Great Twentieth Century Women (1995, p. 20). (In order to tie the quote to the present discussion Hilton has interpolated the words “BY DANIL DANNIN”, thereby introducing an error, as that author’s statement was not published in 1955.) Gabor cites the biography of Marić by Desanka Trbuhović-Gjurić (Im Schatten Albert Einsteins: Das tragische Leben der Mileva Einstein-Marić, 1988 [first edition 1983, p. 79]) as her source. Gabor has simply reproduced Trbuhović-Gjurić’s grossly misleading report of what Joffe wrote, including her evidence-free speculations about the background circumstances. So we have Hilton copying Gabor, who in turn reproduces an erroneous passage by Trbuhović-Gjurić misleadingly purporting to report what Joffe wrote! It would be difficult to find a more blatant example of shoddy scholarship (on the part of all three writers). Schulmann and Holton have aptly described passages in the relevant chapter in Gabor’s book as “flights of journalistic fantasy”.
Bizarrely, Hilton writes “ESTERSON DOES
NOT DISPUTE THE QUOTATION THAT THE NAMES 'EINSTEIN-MARITY' WERE SEEN BY JOFFE
ON THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS SUBMITTED FOR PUBLICATION IN 1905.” This
confusingly expressed sentence needs disentangling. First note that Hilton is
manifestly in error when she refers in the plural to “Einstein-Marity”. That is
a single name, and Joffe described
him as “a bureaucrat at the Patent Office in
Hilton writes: “ABRAHAM F JOFFE, A
MEMBER OF THE SOVIET ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, CLAIMED THAT HE SAW THE ORIGINAL
PAPERS WHEN HE WAS AN ASSISTANT TO WILHELM RONTGEN WHO BELONGED TO THE
EDITORIAL BOARD OF ANNALEN DER PHYSIK WHICH PUBLISHED THE ARTICLES.”
This is false through and through. Joffe
says nothing like this. Hilton, following her consultant Senta Troemel-Ploetz
(1990, p. 419), is citing the grossly misleading report in Desanka
Trbuhović-Gjurić’s deeply flawed biography of Marić (1983, p.
79; 1991 [French trans.], pp. 111-112).
Hilton writes: WE DISPUTE THEIR CLAIM
PARTICULARLY WHEN EINSTEIN NEVER REFERRED TO HIMSELF AS EINSTEIN-MARITY IN
LATER PUBLISHED WORKS. MARITY WAS MARIĆ'S HUNGARIANISED MAIDEN NAME.
This is a complete non sequitur! It assumes that the issue is about what
name Einstein referred to himself as.
But all we have is a statement by Joffe
in which he clearly assigns the authorship of the 1905 Brownian Motion, photon
theory, and special relativity papers to a single author (“a bureaucrat at the
Patent Office”), citing a single
[hyphenated] name, which he apparently thought was the correct way to refer to
the (at the time) Swiss resident Albert Einstein. All this has been examined in
meticulous detail by John Stachel in Einstein’s
Miraculous Year: Five Papers that Changed the Face of Physics (2005), pp.
liv-lxiii, to which anyone genuinely
interested in knowing the documentable facts should turn (rather than to
story-spinning by individuals who have decided on the ‘facts’ on the basis of
misleading second or third-hand reports by interested parties, and who
evidently make no attempt to even read, let alone digest, the rebuttals of
their claims).
3. The
account of the discovery of the Einstein/Marić letters is "totally
and unequivocally false" [Robert Schulmann]. THE DOCUMENTARY DREW ON
THE ACCOUNT AS TOLD BY ROBERT SCHULMANN IN HIS INTERVIEW. IT WAS TRUNCATED FOR
BREVITY'S SAKE.
Perhaps Hilton would like to explain how
an account described as “totally and unequivocally false” by the person
directly involved in the matter is rendered satisfactory by the statement that
it was “truncated for brevity’s sake”!
4. The
publication of the Einstein/Marić letters did not "rock the
international scientific community." THIS IS TAKEN FROM NEWSPAPER
REPORTS AT THE TIME OF THE DISCOVERY OF THE LOVE LETTERS. FOR EXAMPLE: The
OUT FROM THE SHADOWS OF 'GREAT' MEN Author: Ellen Goodman, Globe Staff
Date: Thursday, March 15, 1990 […]
I fear this illustrates the level of
scholarship at which Hilton works: Reports in newspapers suffice to ‘prove’ her
point.
5. Marić
did not "specialise in theoretical physics." MARIĆ AND
EINSTEIN WERE THE ONLY TWO STUDENTS WHO UNDERTOOK THEORETICAL PHYSICS IN THEIR
DEGREE THAT YEAR. IT IS REASONABLE TO CONCLUDE THAT BEING THE CASE, THAT
THEORETICAL PHYSICS HELD A SPECIAL INTEREST FOR BOTH OF THEM.
Einstein and Marić were studying
for a diploma to teach mathematics and physics in secondary school. The physics
part comprised the normal theoretical and experimental topics. They did not
“specialise in theoretical physics”.
6.
Lenard was not "one of the great pioneers of quantum physics."
REFER BELOW. LENARD WAS STRONGLY ANTI-SEMITIC WHICH WE STRONGLY OPPOSE,
HOWEVER, THIS DOES NOT DETRACT FROM HIS SCIENTIFIC WORK.
Ignoring the initial non sequitur, I’ll
take up the referral to item 32 in the “website” list of her comments in her
full response:
(32). Philipp Lenard was not "a pioneer in quantum physics."
SEE FOLLOWING:
[Hilton proceeds to supply a very
detailed listing of Lenard’s professional career which she has copied directly
from the Lenard entry
in Wikipedia.]
Hilton has wasted her time reproducing a
history of Lenard’s work, since it does not include pioneering work on quantum
physics!
7. Marić
did not keep Einstein "abreast of" the "brave new world" of
the photoelectric effect, etc. MARIĆ’S LETTER TO EINSTEIN DETAILS HER
EXCITEMENT IN ATTENDING LENARD'S LECTURE. REFER TO WEBSITE REBUTTALS ON
LENARD'S PIONEERING
Marić’s letter in question (late
1897, at the time of her semester spent at
8. There
is no evidence that Marić "cut classes" at
I am very familiar with the letters in
question and know of no letters in which Marić writes of spending less
time attending lectures. Hilton makes this assertion without providing
citations.
Here is what Robert Schulmann said in the documentary:
“It’s well known that Einstein of course did not attend many courses but was able to use the notes from his good friend Marcel Grossman. And, my view of Mileva is that she was a much more orthodox student in that she did attend classes and, however successful or not, she took her coursework very seriously as she took everything very seriously.”
Clearly Schulmann did not state that Marić cut classes; on the contrary he emphasized that, unlike Einstein, she was an orthodox student who did attend classes.
Equally important is that Hilton’s response reveals she has a very limited notion of what is meant by scholarly research. She evidently doesn’t understand that it is not a question of what I say, or of what Schulmann says, but whether the documentary record shows it to be the case. Hilton makes no attempt to justify her assertion by citing the documents that would demonstrate what she is contending, but cites someone (allegedly) saying it is the case.
9. Marić
was not, with Einstein, "trying to solve the puzzles of the universe in
mathematical form . . ." CAN ESTERSON PROVIDE EVIDENCE TO THE
CONTRARY? REFER TO THEIR SON, HANS WHO SAW THEM WORKING TOGETHER AS WELL AS A
STUDENT WHO LIVED WITH THEM.
I have provided rebuttals of the assertions in the second sentence, but Hilton is evidently not interested in reading the actual documentation of challenges to her claims. See:
http://www.esterson.org/einsteinwife1.htm
http://www.esterson.org/milevaMarić.htm
http://www.esterson.org/Who_Did_Einsteins_Mathematics.htm
Hans Albert was an infant or young boy at the time, so he cannot possibly have provided direct evidence that Marić was working with Einstein on advanced physics and mathematics. For the dubious evidential value of the other item Hilton cites (from a third-hand report by Trbuhović-Gjurić obtained some fifty years after the event) about the then-student Svetozar Varičak who lived with the Einsteins around 1912-1913, see http://www.esterson.org/milevaMarić.htm [See also below, item 25]
Hilton writes: CAN ESTERSON PROVIDE
EVIDENCE TO THE CONTRARY? This question is scarcely deserving of a response. It
is virtually impossible to prove a negative in relation to such an issue. It is
up to those making the claims to provide genuine evidence (not hearsay
third-hand statements from interested parties obtained many decades after the
events in question).
10. Einstein
did not "fail [his] final exams." A MARK OF FIVE WAS NEEDED AT
THE TIME OF THEIR STUDIES TO PASS. EINSTEIN ACHIEVED 4.9.
It is absolutely extraordinary that Hilton repeatedly recycles undocumented and unsubstantiated assertions with no attempt to examine the rebuttals to them. Here she is simply repeated an unsubstantiated assertion made by Troemel-Ploetz, whose article on which much of Hilton’s case is based is replete with erroneous statements and dubious logic. See:
http://www.esterson.org/milevamaric.htm
http://www.esterson.org/Who_Did_Einsteins_Mathematics.htm
Troemel-Ploetz provides no evidence that
the pass grade was 5, and Stachel has searched the archives of Zurich
Polytechnic (ETH) and has found no evidence this was the case. (Incidentally,
on the scale 1-6, with 1 effectively zero mark, Einstein’s average grade of
4.91 works out at approximately 78 percent, a reasonably creditable result by
Einstein, especially in the light of the fact that he spent much of his time on
his own personal research.)
11. The
board of examiners did not "round Albert's mark to a pass." SEE
ABOVE #10.
Since there is absolutely no evidence
for Hilton’s assertion in item 10, the same applies to her response here.
12. Troemel-Ploetz's
"explanation" for Marić's failure that "Einstein already
has his diploma and she doesn't need one, one is enough in one family" is
absurd, as they didn't marry until nearly three years later. THERE ARE
NUMEROUS STUDIES AND PAPERS WHICH CONCLUDE THAT FEMALE UNDERGRADUATES,
ACADEMICS, RESEARCHERS, WRITERS ETC., ARE PENALISED IN THEIR MARKS WHEN
COMPARED TO MALE UNDERGRADUATES. BLINDFOLD STUDIES HAVE BEEN DONE WHERE
STUDENTS SUBMIT WORK WITHOUT NAMES, WHICH WHEN RESUBMITTED WITH NAMES ATTACHED
SHOWED WIDE VARIENCE IN MARKS WITH FEMALES SCORING FAR LESS THAN THEIR MALE
COLLEAGUES IN THE BLIND SUBMISSION. IT WAS WELL KNOWN BEFORE THE END OF THEIR
STUDIES, THAT MARIĆ AND EINSTEIN WERE LOVERS. IN CORRESPONDENCE TO
EINSTEIN, MARIĆ STRONGLY INDICATED THAT SHE HAD A PERSONALITY CLASH WITH
ONE OF HER LECTURERS. REFER STUDIES BY:
Steinpreis, R.E., Anders, K. A., &
Ritzke, D. The impact of gender on the review of the curricula vitae of job
applicants and tenure candidates: A National Empirical Study. Sex Roles: A
Journal of Research Vol 41, Nos 7/8, 1999 pp509-528.
For Woman In Science, Slow Progress In
Academia, Sara Reimer, New York Times April 15th, 2005.
[…] Etc, etc, etc.
Cathy Kessels and others mentioned Neal
Koblitz's AWN newsletter article Are
Student Ratings Unfair to Women?
Hilton’s response above must rank high
in the non sequitur department. Virtually all of it fails to address the actual
statement I made. The nearest to it is the following:
IT WAS WELL KNOWN BEFORE THE END OF
THEIR STUDIES, THAT MARIĆ AND EINSTEIN WERE LOVERS.
That this was known among their friends
is not evidence that their professors also had detailed knowledge about the personal lives of their students.
(More exactly, Einstein and Marić were boy/girl friends. They did not
becomes “lovers” in the modern sense until after they had taken their diploma
final exams in 1900.) Hilton fails to address the fact that Troemel-Ploetz’s
evidence-free speculation that the Conference of Examiners argued that “one
[diploma] is enough in one family” is absurd, as they didn't marry until nearly
three years later. How could the Examiners possibly know that a romantic
relationship between fellow students would result in marriage some years down
the line?
Hilton writes: IN CORRESPONDENCE TO
EINSTEIN, MARIĆ STRONGLY INDICATED THAT SHE HAD A PERSONALITY CLASH WITH
ONE OF HER LECTURERS.
The clash in question, with Prof Weber,
did not occur until 1901, after
Marić had failed in her first attempt for a diploma. In any case, Weber
taught her experimental physics, the topic for which she obtained the highest
grade in 1900! Her failure to obtain a diploma was the consequence of her extremely poor grade in mathematics, not
in any physics topic.
13. Einstein's
personal research on physics did not depend on "Mileva's access and good
standing with their professor [Weber] to keep their private research
alive." THIS IS A BLATENTLY FALSE STATEMENT. EINSTEIN STATES IN ONE OF
HIS LETTERS TO MILEVA THAT SHE MUST KEEP IN THE GOOD BOOKS WTH PROFESSOR WEBER
WHO WAS SUPERVISING HER DOCTORATE BECAUSE THEY NEEDED THE USE OF HIS LABORATORY
FOR THEIR OWN RESEARCH.
Far from my statement being false,
Hilton’s reply only illustrates further her ignorance of the subject matter.
Einstein needed the use of Weber’s laboratory for his Ph.D. thesis on thermal
conductivity. (He wanted to obtain a Ph.D. to improve his career prospects.)
This is distinct from his personal work on physics topics that really
interested him (what I called his personal research), which was to lead to his
celebrated papers of 1905. That he had access to Weber’s laboratory in 1901
made no difference to his private
research, as is shown by the fact that he very soon ceased to study for his
Ph.D. under Weber, but this in no way hindered the theoretical research he was
working on.
The letter to which Hilton alludes
(August/September 1900) does not, as
she claims, say that they needed the use of the laboratory for “their” [sic]
own private research. In that letter Einstein is clearly referring to
Marić’s diploma dissertation (which she hoped to extend for a Ph.D.
thesis) and to his own first attempt for a Ph.D. Both were on the subject of
heat conduction, for which they wanted to use Weber’s well-equipped laboratory.
14. There
are very many more instances of Einstein using "I" and "my"
in relation to his extracurricular work in letters when they were students than
of his use of "we" and "our." The relatively rare use of
"our" sometimes referred to their co-operative study on their diploma
dissertations, not Einstein's personal work on physics. Also, the Special
Relativity theory was only arrived at by Einstein several years later.
FALSE. MARIĆ AND EINSTEIN'S LETTERS TO EACH OTHER TALK ABOUT THE LATEST
SCIENTIFIC BOOKS BEING READ BY THEM WHICH WERE NOT PART OF THEIR CURRICULUM.
No one disputes that Einstein and
Marić read extra-curricular books together when they were students. Not
only does that not show that Marić was producing ideas of her own on these
topics (not one of her surviving letters has any such ideas, or references to
work she is doing outside her Polytechnic coursework), it is a non-sequitur as
a response to my statement about personal pronouns. And it is Einstein’s letters that “talk about” the
latest scientific books, not Marić’s. The whole issue of Einstein’s use of
personal pronouns in his letters of 1897-1901 in relation to his
extra-curricular work is examined in meticulous detail in Stachel’s writings on
the issue, as well as in my articles, and it is impossible here to go beyond
the statement in heavy type immediately after the number “14” just above. It
is, however, worth emphasizing that proponents of the “collaboration” thesis
never mention that on several occasions when Einstein referred to physics using
the first person plural he was alluding to work they were doing on heat
conduction (which for both of them was the subject of their diploma
dissertations), not to his extra-curricular interests.
See http://www.esterson.org/milevamaric.htm
15. Marić
was not with Einstein when he inaugurated the "
No
one, of course, suggests she didn’t attend
the meetings, which were held at the Einsteins’ residence. I was merely
pointing out a chronological error in the documentary which makes it seem that
Marić was involved in the inaugurating
of the “
16. Solovine
did not say of Marić that "she occasionally joined in." He said
the opposite, that she listened but never contributed to the discussions.
Solovine did not say of Marić that she was "clearly more interested
in physics than housework." THESE WERE DIRECT QUOTES FROM DENIS
OVERBYE IN HIS INTERVIEW BASED ON HIS BOOK "A SCIENTIFIC ROMANCE."
SOLOVINE DID STATE "Mileva, intelligent and reserved, listened to us
attentively."
Hilton’s response is absolutely
extraordinary. First, she ignores the falsehood in the documentary that I am
objecting to, and emphasizes something which no one take issue with. Second,
she defends what was stated in the documentary on the grounds that Dennis
Overbye told her! Does she know nothing about scholarly research? The only way to check the facts is to
examine what Solovine actually wrote, which was that “Mileva, intelligent and
reserved, listened attentively but never
intervened in our discussions” (my emphasis). (Albert Einstein: Letters to Solovine, 1987, p. 13).
Incidentally, Solovine’s writing that
Marić “never intervened in our discussions” suggests she was more an
interested observer than a fully-fledged ‘member’ of the group. (In none of the
later letters between the individuals concerned alluding to their meetings at
that time is Marić mentioned as a participant.)
17. The
evidence that "Mileva's father visits them shortly after the birth and
offers Einstein a handsome dowry" is based on dubious third-hand
reminiscences obtained decades later. WHY IS THE SOURCE WHO IS QUOTED AS
SAYING THIS DUBIOUS? IS ESTERSON A SCIENCE HISTORIAN?
One does not have to be a “science
historian” to assess the evidential value of third-hand reminiscences from
interested parties obtained many decades after the event. See
The dubious statements attributed to Einstein in Trbuhović-Gjurić’s book at the time of the supposed visit mentioned above suffices to cast doubt on the story, as I explain in my article http://www.esterson.org/einsteinwife1.htm, especially the final statement that I deal with at the very end of the article. (See item 28 below.)
18. There
is no serious evidence that Einstein told Marić's father "I didn't
marry her for money. I married her because I love her, because we are one. She
is my guardian angel against the sins of life and especially so in the
sciences." It is a fourth-hand report of reminiscences by an interested
party obtained decades later. REFER TO Trbuhović-Gjurić,
BIOGRAPHY.
It says everything we need to know about
Hilton’s mode of ‘research’ that she thinks that a reference to
Trbuhović-Gjurić’s book (which she no doubt obtained from
Treomel-Ploetz’s 1990 article that uncritically recycles Trbuhović-Gjurić’s
claims) in which the alleged quotation is given suffices to validate her
position! I have closely examined relevant passages in this book and shown that
it is utterly unreliable as a work of historical research. Likewise Schulmann and
Holton call the book “a nationalist puffery of a biography of Mileva
Marić”, and the Einstein biographer Albrecht Fölsing describes it as a
combination of “fictional invention and pseudo-documentation”. See the discussion of the above alleged quotation in http://www.esterson.org/einsteinwife1.htm
See also the relevant sections on Trbuhović-Gjurić’s claims in general in
http://www.esterson.org/milevaMarić.htm
http://www.esterson.org/Who_Did_Einsteins_Mathematics.htm
19. The
"Einsteins" did not submit five papers for publication in 1905.
Einstein alone did that. IT WAS A COLLABORATIVE EFFORT. THE FACT THAT
EINSTEIN'S NAME WAS ON THE PAPERS DOES NOT DISCOUNT MARIĆ'S CONTRIBUTION.
Hilton evidently thinks that in response
to rebuttals based on a close examination of all the documents available (see
my article cited above, plus the relevant Stachel
citations therein) it suffices to simply repeat her claim.
20. Marić
did not "review scientific papers." INCORRECT — SHE DID.
My response is the same as to Hilton’s
assertion in (19) immediately above. See: http://www.esterson.org/einsteinwife1.htm
(search for “reviews”)
21. There
is no serious evidence that Marić told Einstein in private conversation:
"This is a great achievement, a beautiful achievement." THE
DOCUMENTARY'S SOURCE WAS Trbuhović-Gjurić biography on Mileva.
See my comments above (item 18) about
Trbuhović-Gjurić’s deeply flawed biography.
22.
Marić did not work with Einstein on the E=mc2 1905 paper. WHY THEN DID
EINSTEIN WRITE TO MARIĆ "'How happy and proud I will be, when we two
together have victoriously led our work on relative motion to an end!' — Albert
Einstein." EINSTEIN'S WORDS ARE EVIDENCE ALONE THAT THEY HAD ALREADY
COMMENCED JOINT RESEARCH ON RELATIVE MOTION THEORY.
I have already responded to this in item
2 above. I must, however, reiterate how tiresome it is debating with someone
who makes no attempt to read rebuttals of her assertions, but merely repeats
them as if they hadn’t been decisively refuted.
(The next items 22, 23, 24, have already
been dealt with under related item 2 above.)
25. There
is no serious evidence "they debated, calculated and read and write about
science problems" at this time. AGAIN THE USE OF THE WORD 'SERIOUS' IS
AN ATTEMPT TO DIMINISH WRITTEN EVIDENCE FROM PRIMARY SOURCE DOCUMENTATION SUCH
AS LETTERS WHICH SPEAK ABOUT MARIĆ SPENDING ALL HER TIME WITH EINSTEIN
WORKING TOGETHER. E.G. AND THIS IS IN 1910! "Svetozar Varičak, a
student who lived with the Einsteins for several months in about 1910,
remembered how Marić, after a day of cleaning, cooking and caring for the
children, would then busy herself with Einstein's mathematical calculations,
often working late into the night. Varičak said he remembered feeling 'so
sorry for Mileva' that he sometimes helped her with the housework" Source:
Trbuhović-Gjurić. ADDITIONALLY, "DURING THE EARLY YEARS OF THEIR
MARRIAGE, WHICH ARE ALSO THE MOST PRODUCTIVE PERIOD OF EINSTEIN'S CAREER,
EINSTEIN CREDITS MARIĆ WITH 'SOLVING ALL OF HIS MATHEMATICAL PROBLEMS,' A
FACT CONFIRMED BY THEIR SON HANS ALBERT. SOURCE: DORD KRISTIC — INTERVIEW WITH
HANS ALBERT EINSTEIN.
Hilton has a strange notion of what
constitutes “primary source documentation”. She writes: “Svetozar Varičak,
a student who lived with the Einsteins for several months in about 1910,
remembered how Marić, after a day of cleaning, cooking and caring for the
children, would then busy herself with Einstein's mathematical calculations,
often working late into the night. Varičak said he remembered feeling ‘so
sorry for Mileva’ that he sometimes helped her with the housework.”
Hilton gives the reference
Trbuhović-Gjurić, but in fact this is a direct copying of a passage
from the aforementioned chapter in the book by Andrea Gabor, Einstein’s Wife (1995, p. 20). For the
passage in question Gabor cites the biography of Marić by
Trbuhović-Gjurić (1988; first edition 1983, p. 79; 1991 [French
trans.], p. 120]). However, Gabor does not accurately report what
Trbuhović-Gjurić wrote, as she omits the fact that what Varičak
supposedly recalled was actually a recollection by his daughter of her father reminiscing, obtained by
Trbuhović-Gjurić more than fifty years after the alleged occurrences.
Given that I have demonstrated
that in several instances where the source of Trbuhović-Gjurić’s
claims can be examined her accounts are unreliable, this means what we have
here is a third-hand report of the alleged occurrences. Now recollections of
conversations long after the event are notoriously unreliable, and we can have
no idea of what Varičak actually told his daughter. This was at a time
when Marić gave Einstein some limited help in preparing notes for
elementary University lectures in physics, so even if we give some credence to
such third-hand reporting, how can we know what Marić was working on? And
finally, given Einstein’s exceptional abilities at conventional mathematics,
and Marić’s extremely poor grades in the mathematics component of her
Zurich Polytechnic diploma examinations, this kind of hearsay report lacks all
credibility.
Hilton writes: DURING THE EARLY YEARS OF
THEIR MARRIAGE, WHICH ARE ALSO THE MOST PRODUCTIVE PERIOD OF EINSTEIN'S CAREER,
EINSTEIN CREDITS MARIĆ WITH 'SOLVING ALL OF HIS MATHEMATICAL PROBLEMS.'
Once again Hilton has copied this
passage directly from Gabor’s deeply flawed chapter on Marić. Gabor does
not give a citation for the claim that Einstein credits Marić with
“solving all of his mathematical problems”, but in fact it comes once again
from Trbuhović-Gjurić (1983, p. 75; 1991, p.
106). As I’ve said, given Einstein’s considerable abilities in
conventional mathematics, and Marić’s very poor grades in the mathematics
exams in both her failed attempts to obtain a diploma, this claim is inherently
absurd. For my documentation of Einstein’s exceptional abilities in
conventional mathematics, see http://www.esterson.org/Who_Did_Einsteins_Mathematics.htm
For the identification of the highly dubious
source of the claim that Einstein credited Marić with solving all his
mathematics problems, see http://www.esterson.org/milevamaric.htm
Hilton writes that the above claim is A
FACT CONFIRMED BY THEIR SON HANS ALBERT. SOURCE: DORD KRISTIC — INTERVIEW WITH
HANS ALBERT EINSTEIN.
Krstić interviewed Hans Albert
Einstein in 1971 [E. R. Einstein, Hans
Albert Einstein, 1991, p. 15], more than sixty years after the events in
question, which occurred when Hans Albert was a very young boy. How could he
possibly know what his parents were working on? As I have already noted, around
the time in question Marić gave Einstein some limited assistance in
preparing notes on elementary mechanics for his new teaching post at
Finally: With reference to Hilton’s
(copied) claim that THE EARLY YEARS OF
THEIR MARRIAGE [WERE] ALSO THE MOST PRODUCTIVE
PERIOD OF EINSTEIN'S CAREER, the way that she repeats assertions by people as
ignorant of the scientific subject matter as she is quite extraordinary.
Einstein was exceptionally productive in a number of areas of physics up to
well into his forties, most notably during the several years in which he was
working on what is widely regarded as his greatest achievement, the general
theory of relativity.
26. There
is no evidence that Mileva Marić's "name was removed" as
co-author from the 1905 papers, since it wasn't there in the first place.
JOFFE SAID HE SAW THE NAMES 'EINSTEIN-MARITY' ON THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT. JOFFE
WAS AND REMAINS A HIGHLY REGARDED SCIENTIST IN THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY.
Joffe made no reference whatsoever to
the original manuscripts. Also, it shouldn’t need saying that “Einstein-Marity”
is a single name, it does not
comprise two “names” Einstein and Marity [Marić]. I have already dealt
with this topic in some detail above.
27. There
is not a scrap of evidence that Marić "actually prepares some of
Einstein's [public] lectures." YES THERE IS. REF: DORD KRSTIĆ WHO
HAS A COPY OF ONE OF EINSTEIN'S LECTURES WHICH IS WRITTEN IN MILEVA'S HAND.
The lecture in question is not one of Einstein’s public lectures
(on advanced physics). A photograph of the first page of the notes in
Marić’s hand (one of eight) in Krstić’s 2004 book (p. 143) confirms
the statement in the Collected Papers
(Vol. 3, p. 125) that they follow closely the first pages of Einstein’s first
set of lecture notes that he prepared for an introductory course on mechanics
at Zurich University, and that they are at a level such that a competent
University physics student could have produced them. See http://www.esterson.org/milevaMarić.htm
28. The
statement in the voice of "Einstein" at the end of the documentary,
"Without her I would never have started my work, and certainly not
finished it," is without foundation. It is also absurd, because at that
time (1904 according to the narrator earlier in the film) Einstein had scarcely
begun his work, and it is inconceivable that he would have said he'd
"finished it." THESE OBJECTIONS ARE PLAINLY BIASED. THIS
STATEMENT IS AN ALL ENCOMPASSING GRACE NOTE, NOT A LITERAL REFERENCE TO 1904.
IT IS TAKEN FROM A FIRST HAND ACCOUNT BY THE Trbuhović-Gjurić, WHO
INTERVIEWED MARIĆ'S RELATIVES WITH WHOM EINSTEIN STAYED ON HIS VISITS BACK
TO NOVI SAD. ROBERT SHULMANN VISITED Trbuhović-Gjurić, WHEN SHE WAS
GRAVELY ILL IN ZURICH SUCH WAS HIS STRONG BELIEF THAT SHE MAY HAVE CRITICAL
INFORMATION WHICH MIGHT LEAD HIM TO THE WHEREABOUTS OF THE LONG LOST LOVE
LETTERS.
This response of Hilton’s is, I’m
afraid, only too typical of her replies to rebuttals to her contentions,
lacking evidential backing and even basic logic. Trbuhović-Gjurić’s
book has the sentence I quote above (in heavy type, “Without her…) at the end
of a little speech that, according to earlier in the documentary, Einstein made
to Marić’s father in
Hilton writes: IT IS TAKEN FROM A FIRST
HAND ACCOUNT BY Trbuhović-Gjurić, WHO INTERVIEWED MARIĆ'S
RELATIVES WITH WHOM EINSTEIN STAYED ON HIS VISITS BACK TO NOVI SAD.
Hilton seems to have little idea of the
meaning of a “first hand account”. Since the speech was allegedly made to
Marić’s father Miloš (who died in 1922) on a visit to the Einsteins in
* Without actually quoting the alleged
“speech” by Einstein to his father-in-law, Dord Krstić (2004, p. 104,
n.231) writes that his source for the information about it is Sofija
Golubović, whom he interviewed in 1961. Supposedly Miloš Marić, on
his return to his home in
Hilton writes: ROBERT SHULMANN VISITED
Trbuhović-Gjurić, WHEN SHE WAS GRAVELY ILL IN ZURICH SUCH WAS HIS
STRONG BELIEF THAT SHE MAY HAVE CRITICAL INFORMATION WHICH MIGHT LEAD HIM TO
THE WHEREABOUTS OF THE LONG LOST LOVE LETTERS.
What this statement is doing here is
puzzling, as it has no relevance to the point at issue – unless Hilton thinks
that because Schulmann thought he might get information from Trbuhović-Gjurić
about some very specific documents this somehow gives credence to
Trbuhović-Gjurić’s writings. If so, this is another of her non
sequiturs. Hilton’s statement implies this was the sole reason for Schulmann’s
visiting Trbuhović-Gjurić, but he reports that he tried to get
information about her story about the Joffe claims. According to Schulmann, on
this issue “She gave me what I can only call charitably an extremely weak
explanation” (A. Pais, 1994, p. 15). (The facts about how Schulmann was instrumental
in bringing the Einstein/Marić correspondence to light, having discovered
that they were in the possession of the Hans Albert Einstein family, are
reported in Highfield & Carter (1993), pp. 279-281.)
Final
Summing Up:
Hilton has not justified a single one of
her claims highlighted above. Her responses illustrate that she has little
notion of what is meant by scholarly research, or indeed, at times even what
constitutes a logical argument.
December 2006